Sunday, March 2, 2014

How would proportional representation work in Peel and Halton?

How would
proportional representation work in Peel and Halton?

Polls show more than 70%
of Canadians support proportional representation for Canadian elections, and
the Liberal Party of Canada has opened the door to start implementing it within
one year of the 2015 election.

So this is no longer
an academic discussion. This is a practical discussion: if Canada gets PR, how
would it work in Peel Region and Halton Region?

Mixed Proportional

With the Mixed Proportional system, you have two votes. With
one, you help elect a local MP as we do today. With the other, you vote for the party you want to see
in government, and for your favourite of your party’s regional candidates. In
this way, you
also help elect a few regional MPs to top-up the local results so that every
vote counts: it’s proportional. You can vote for the regional candidate you
prefer: it’s personal. There would be no closed lists. Voters would elect all the MPs.

You can vote for the
candidate you like best for local MP without hurting your party, since the
party make-up of parliament is set by the party votes. In New Zealand, 30% of
voters split their votes that way.

Voters would elect
more than one MP, so they would have competing representatives, likely
including someone they helped elect. Every vote counts. Fair Vote Canada says rural and urban
voters in every region should have fair representation in both government and
opposition.

Two models

In 2015 Peel and Halton will have 14 MPs (16 if you include Burlington and Dufferin—Caledon), including four new ridings: Brampton
Centre and South, Mississauga Centre, and Milton.

It could be two
regions, in the model discussed here: Brampton—Mississauga East will have seven MPs, including
new Brampton Centre and South. Mississauga Southwest—Halton will have seven, including new
Mississauga Centre and Milton.

In 2011 those voters elected five Conservative MPs, no one else. Yet those
voters voted only 42% Conservative, 33% Liberal, 22% New Democrat, and 3% Green.
If every vote counted equally, in 2015 Conservative voters would elect three
MPs, Liberal voters two MPs, and New Democrat voters two MPs.

Mississauga Southwest—Halton

In 2011 those voters
elected five Conservative MPs, no one else. Yet those voters voted only 49%
Conservative, 32% Liberal, 15% New Democrat, and 3% Green. If every vote
counted equally, in 2015 Conservative voters would elect four MPs, Liberal
voters two MPs, and New Democrat voters one MP.

Peel—Halton

Across the whole
region, in 2011 these voters elected 12 Conservative MPs, no one else. Yet
those voters voted only 48% Conservative, 30% Liberal, 18% NDP, and 4% Green. If every vote counted equally, in 2015
Conservative voters would elect eight MPs, Liberal voters five MPs, and New
Democrat voters three MPs.

But this is on the votes
cast in 2011. When every vote counts, turnout will be at least 6% higher, and
no one will have to cast a “strategic vote.” Another 3,000 Green voters would have
been enough to elect a Green MP. Who can say what would be the result of real
democratic elections?

The majority of these
MPs would still be local MPs. The other would be regional MPs, topping up the
results to make them match the vote shares.

In the first model, based
on the UK’s Jenkins Commission Report, the local MP is elected by a preferential ballot. In Brampton (Bramalea-Gore-Malton) that
would have meant an NDP MP, Jagmeet Singh. So, in the region of Brampton—Mississauga East, maybe there would be three local Conservative MPs, and one NDP. In that case, you would also see two regional Liberal MPs and one regional
NDP MP. In the region of Mississauga Southwest—Halton, likely there
would have been four local MPs, all Conservative, and three regional MPs: two Liberal, and one New Democrat.In the second model, adding Burlington and Dufferin—Caledon, we would see eight local Conservatuve MPs and one NDP, plus five regional Liberal MPs and two NDP.

How would party
members from these regions nominate and rank a group of regional candidates? It
could be done on-line, and with live convention sites in Brampton and in
Oakville, or in Mississauga. Likely party members would nominate the same candidates
nominated in the local ridings, and some additional regional candidates. But
voters would have the final say, since they can vote for their party’s regional
candidate they prefer.

The result is this:
on top of having local MPs, voters would also elect regional MPs. With two
regional Liberal MPs in Brampton—Mississauga East, it might be two of those who got the most votes in 2011: Peter Fonseca, Navdeep Bains and
Andrew Kania. The regional NDP MP might have been Manjit Grewal or Waseem Ahmed. With two local Conservative MPs from the present huge ridings of Brampton Springdale and Brampton West, both slated to be split in 2015, Kyle Seeback and Parm Gill would still expect to be local MPs, along with Eve Adams.In Mississauga Southwest—Halton,
the two regional Liberal MPs might have been Bonnie Crombie and Paul Szabo. The regional NDP MP might have been
Michelle Bilek, or Pat Heroux or Aijaz Naqvi. Stella Ambler, Lisa Raitt, Terence Young, and Robert Dechert or Brad Butt would still be local MPs.In the second model, the same Peter Fonseca, Navdeep Bains, Andrew Kania, Bonnie Crombie and Paul Szabo would likely be regional Liberal MPs, along with two NDP regonal MPs. The local Conservative MPs would, again, likely be Stella Ambler, Lisa Raitt, Terence Young, Kyle Seeback and Eve Adams, along with Mike Wallace, David Tilson or Parm Gill, and Robert Dechert or Brad Butt.

How would regional
MPs operate? The regional MPs would cover several ridings each. Just the way it’s done in Scotland.
Many regional MPs would need several offices, just as David Tilson already has
offices in Bolton and Orangeville.

Canada-wide
consequences.

Of course,
proportional representation would mean a lot for Canada. We would not likely
have a one party government’s Prime Minister holding all the power. Parliament
would reflect the diverse voters of every province.

With this kind of power-sharing, Canada would look quite different.

If we had a Proportional Representation voting system, here are only a few
of the things Canadians could have accomplished over the past twenty years:

Ø Engaged and motivated voters

Ø A reinvigorated democratic system

Ø More women MPs and a fair mix of party representation

If we had used province-wide totals
with perfect proportionality the projected results on the 2011 votes with the
extra 30 MPs would be: 140 Conservatives, 103 NDP, 64 Liberals, 18 Bloc, and 13
Green.

With these mixed
models, the projected results are 141 Conservatives, 107 or 108 NDP, 65 or 67
Liberals, 15 or 17 Bloc, and 8 or 9 Greens. Close to perfect proportionality,
while keeping all MPs accountable to real local and regional communities.

This is not a partisan scheme. Unrepresented Conservative voters would elect eight or nine more Quebec
MPs, one more in Newfoundland, one more in PEI, and one more on Vancouver
Island.

Our electoral system is broken and people know it:

Ø Disengaged citizens are rejecting their right to vote

Ø A dysfunctional conflict-oriented political process

Ø An unelected Senate that rewards loyal party members with expensive
perks

Ø Majority governments with minority voting results

Poll results on proportional
representation

Environics asked “Some people favor bringing in a form of proportional
representation. This means that the total number of seats held by each party in
Parliament would be roughly equivalent to their percentage of the national
popular vote. Would you strongly support, somewhat support, somewhat oppose, or
strongly oppose moving towards a system of proportional representation in
Canadian elections?”

Interviewing for this Environics National Telephone Survey was conducted
between March 18th – 24th, 2013, among a national random sample of 1,004
adults. The margin of error for a sample of this size is +/- 3.10%, 19 times
out of 20.

Result: support 70%, oppose 18%, depends 6%, don’t know 6%.

The Environics poll
showed 93% of Green voters support proportional representation while 4% oppose,
82% of NDP voters support it while 11% oppose, 77% of Liberal voters support it
while 15% oppose, 62% of Conservative supporters support it while 28% oppose,
and 55% of voters undecided as to party support PR while 19% oppose and 27%
said “don’t know” or “depends.”

About Me

Although I am a member of Fair Vote Canada's Council at the federal level, the views expressed on this blog are my own.
I have been a lawyer since 1971, an elected school trustee from 1982 to 1994, past chair of the Board of the Northumberland Community Legal Centre, and so on.